GUATEMALA: Journalists in Jeopardy

Veteran television reporter Rolando Santiz was on his way to downtown Guatemala City on Apr. 1 when two gunmen on a motorcycle drove up alongside his car and killed him in a rain of gunfire. The photographer driving with him was wounded but miraculously survived.

RIGHTS: Call to Drop Case Against Journalist

Press freedom groups are calling on the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) to drop its case against a French journalist accused of contempt over a book about the workings of the court.

DEVELOPMENT: Cambodia Looks to Educate Youth About Painful Past

Walking through the former S21 security prison here, one cannot help but be struck by the hundreds of black-and-white photographs of former prisoners who were brought here, tortured, and then executed.

SOUTH KOREA: Schoolgirls at Forefront of Street Protests

Hundreds of teenagers, many of them female, were out on the streets Wednesday demanding a public apology from the Lee Myung-bak government for the tragic death of former president Moo-hyun Roh, who committed suicide last month.

EGYPT: Cyber Insurgency Rattles Regime

Egyptian cyber-dissidents are becoming increasing vocal in their online criticism of President Hosni Mubarak's regime, utilising a widening repertoire of Internet networking and publishing tools to expose government abuses.

CHILE: Study Shows How Leading Paper Colluded with Dictatorship

The coverage of human rights violations cases by the powerful conservative Chilean newspaper El Mercurio during the country’s 17-year dictatorship was the focus of a meticulous study by five young reporters.

TRADE-US: Green Groups Say E-Waste Bill Is Too Lax

Environmentalists are expressing discontent over recently introduced legislation regarding the U.S.’s exporting of electronic waste, or "e-waste".

EAST TIMOR: Journalists Hold Out For Better Media Laws

Journalists in East Timor are anxiously waiting for a set of media laws to be revised after a negative reaction to a draft that was circulated in March.

EGYPT: Thanks to Facebook, Young Women Take to Political Activism

In recent years, Egypt has witnessed increasing participation by women in grassroots political activism. Local civil rights advocates attribute the phenomenon to novel means of communication and organisation, especially the social networking website Facebook.

PAKISTAN: Media in the Taliban’s Crosshairs

Till two months back, Shireen Zada of the private television channel Express News would carry a pistol whenever he covered the news in the restive Swat Valley in Pakistan’s North West Frontier Province (NWFP).

DEVELOPMENT: Make Use of African Skills

The theme of the third biennial Knowledge Management Africa (KMA) conference, which opened Monday in the capital of Senegal, is lofty - "knowledge to reposition Africa in the world economy". But the aim is more down-to-earth: to find ways to apply vital information to the basic question of improving the lives of Africa's people.

EDUCATION-US: Women Reach for Technology Lifeline

When Brunila lost her job as a flight attendant after 10 years on the job, she realised she needed to find a more stable career.

CHILE: Transparency Law Opens Access to Information

The Law on Transparency and Access to Public Information came into force in Chile on Monday. Although experts say there is room for improvement, and they foresee some difficulties in its implementation, they do not hesitate to describe it as a useful step forward.

THAILAND: With Censorship, Thais Turn to Websites and Foreign Media

When the Thai government imposed an emergency law cracking down on rampaging red-shirted protesters on the streets of Bangkok, the military, in combat gear, was not its only weapon. The state’s censors were given liberty to silence critical media.

RIGHTS: Czech Govt Chokes Media

Czech media groups have warned that investigative journalism is under threat after what they described as "draconian" legislation on reporting came into effect.

FIJI: ‘Returning’ Military Leader Gags Media

Fiji is maintaining an uneasy calm days after its president abrogated the constitution, promulgated emergency regulations, and reinstated the 2006 coup leader, Commodore Frank Bainimarama, as interim prime minister.

POLITICS: Thailand Marks New Year with Bullets, Troops Clash with Protesters

Water fights and neon-coloured water guns are a standard feature on Bangkok’s streets at this time of the year. They are part of the revelry as Thais douse each other during their New Year festival, Songkran.

DEVELOPMENT-AFRICA: A Msg of Hope to Farmers

Mobile phones are being used to diagnose and treat crop diseases that cause massive losses to farmers, presenting an opportunity to increase yields as location-specific information about disease threats is made available.

/CORRECTED REPEAT*/US-MEXICO: Clinton Visit Has Aura of Drug Intervention

The Barack Obama administration announced this week that it will augment already massive foreign aid to its southern neighbour in a bid to help Mexico fight cartels smuggling drugs into the U.S., as well as sending a series of high-level U.S. officials to Mexico to consult with their counterparts.

MEDIA-PERU: Women Outnumber, But Men Have the Power

At the start of the new academic year at Peruvian universities this month, women made up between 65 and 72 percent of students in first-year courses in communication and journalism departments, a phenomenon that is reflected in the growing presence of women reporters in newspapers all over the country.

MIDEAST: U.S. Jews Open to Palestinian Unity Govt

Contrary to the views of the likely incoming right-wing government of Israel, most U.S. Jews favour peace negotiations with a Palestinian unity government that would include Hamas, according to a new poll released here Tuesday by the year-old, pro-peace Jewish lobby group, J Street.